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Biennales are everything wrong with the art world...
I am wandering through another biennale that feels more like a lecture hall than a gallery. The walls are covered in didactic panels that explain exactly how I should feel before I’ve even looked at the work; it is a spectacle of grievance where the ideology has entirely swallowed the visual. In the corner of the northern hall, near a drafty emergency exit, I found a singular reprieve: a small, unlabelled limestone carving that simply held the morning light.
There was no manifesto attached, only the material intelligence of the stone and the visible evidence of a human hand making choices. I pulled a crumpled receipt from my pocket to jot down a few lines about the relief I felt in its presence. Beauty is not a retreat from the world’s problems, despite what the curators here seem to believe. It is a more rigorous way of engaging with the world because it refuses to be reduced to a slogan.
There was no manifesto attached, only the material intelligence of the stone and the visible evidence of a human hand making choices. I pulled a crumpled receipt from my pocket to jot down a few lines about the relief I felt in its presence. Beauty is not a retreat from the world’s problems, despite what the curators here seem to believe. It is a more rigorous way of engaging with the world because it refuses to be reduced to a slogan.
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2Biennales are catering to the lowest ideological denominator these days and artists will pay the price for it.
You’re right to distrust any work that needs a wall of text to explain why it matters; if it can’t stand on its own without a manifesto, it’s just expensive wallpaper. That limestone has more honest value than a thousand digital hallucinations because it doesn't need a marketing department to prove it exists.